The 1950s

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The 1950s
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• Baby Boom

It seems to me that every other young housewife I
see is pregnant. -- British visitor to
America, 1958
1957 ? 1 baby born every 7 seconds
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• Baby Boom

Dr. Benjamin Spock and the Anderson Quintuplets
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The GI Bill
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Social Climate after WWII

• After the war, unions began to seek the increases
  in wages that were limited during the war.
• The number of strikes rose sharply.

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Racial Minorities

• Truman issued Executive Order 9981, which ended
  segregation in the U.S. armed forces.
• Hispanic veterans joined together in the American
  GI Forum.

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The Second Red Scare

• In September 1949 Truman announced that the
  Soviet Union had detonated an atomic bomb.
• This was a shock to the nation.
• Truman began to strengthen the nations military
  against a possible Soviet nuclear threat.

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• Communists in China had gained nearly full
  control of the country.
• The Nationalist government of Chiang Kai-shek
  fled to Taiwan
• China was in the hands of the Communist Party
  under the leadership of Mao Zedong.
• Americans worried that China increased the
  Communist threat to the United States.

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HUAC

• The House Un-American Activities Committee
  investigated the full range of radical groups in
  the United States, including Fascists,
  Communists, and members of Hollywood

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The Hollywood Ten

• The Hollywood Ten refused to answer HUAC
  questions about their beliefs or those of their
  colleagues.
• Many others in Hollywood did testify, for if they
  didnt their names were placed on a blacklist.

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Spy Cases

• Alger Hissconvicted of being a spy for the
  Soviets
• Klaus Fuchsa Manhattan Project scientist who
  gave atomic bomb information to the Soviets
• Ethel and Julius Rosenbergconvicted of passing
  secrets to the Soviets and executed

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Joseph McCarthy

• Joseph McCarthy was a senator who claimed that
  there were 205 known Communists working for the
  U.S. Department of State.

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• McCarthys claims were rarely backed up with any
  evidence.
• McCarthyism spread beyond the Senate into other
  branches of government, into universities, into
  labor unions, and into private businesses.

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• In 1952 he began to go after fellow Republicans.
• In 1954 he attacked the U.S. Army, claiming that
  it was protecting Communists.

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• Suburban Living

Levittown, L. I. The American Dream
1949 ? William Levitt produced 150
houses per week.
7,990 or 60/month with no down payment.
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• Suburban Living The New American Dream

1 story high 12x19 living room 2 bedrooms tiled
bathroom garage small backyard front lawn
By 1960 ? 1/3 of the U. S. population in
the suburbs.
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• Suburban Living

SHIFTS IN POPULATION DISTRIBUTION,
1940-1970 1940 1950 1960
1970 Central Cities 31.6 32.3
32.6 32.0 Suburbs 19.5
23.8 30.7 41.6 Rural Areas/ 48.9
43.9 36.7 26.4 Small Towns U. S.
Bureau of the Census.
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• Suburban Living
• The Typical TV Suburban Families

Leave It to Beaver1957-1963
The Donna Reed Show1958-1966
Father Knows Best1954-1958
The Ozzie Harriet Show1952-1966
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• Consumerism

1950 ? Introduction of the Diners Card
All babies were potential consumers who
spearheaded a brand-new market for food,
clothing, and shelter. --
Life Magazine (May, 1958)
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• Consumerism

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A Changing Workplace
Automation 1947-1957 ? factory workers
decreased by 4.3,
eliminating 1.5 million
blue-collar jobs. By 1956 ? more
white-collar than blue-collar
jobs in the U. S. Computers ? Mark I
(1944). First IBM
mainframe computer (1951).
Corporate Consolidation By 1960 ? 600
corporations (1/2 of all
U. S. companies) accounted for
53 of total corporate income. WHY?? Cold
War military buildup.
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A Changing Workplace
New Corporate Culture The Company Man
1956 ? Sloan Wilsons The Man in
the Gray Flannel Suit
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The Culture of the Car

Car registrations 1945 ? 25,000,000
1960 ? 60,000,000 2-family cars
doubles from 1951-1958
1958 Pink Cadillac
1959 Chevy Corvette

• 1956 ? Interstate Highway Act ? largest
  public works project in American
  history!
• Cost 32 billion.
• 41,000 miles of new highways built.

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The Culture of the Car
America became a more homogeneous nation because
of the automobile.
First McDonalds (1955)
Drive-In Movies
Howard Johnsons
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The Culture of the Car

The U. S. population was on the move in the
1950s. NE Mid-W ? S SW (Sunbelt states)
1955 ? Disneyland opened in Southern California.
(40 of the guests came from outside
California, most by car.)
Main Street
Tomorrow Land
Frontier Land
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Television

1946 ? 7,000 TV sets in the U. S.1950 ?
50,000,000 TV sets in the U. S.
Television is a vast wasteland. ? Newton Minnow,
Chairman of the Federal Communications
Commission, 1961
Mass Audience ? TV celebrated traditionalAmerican
values.
Truth, Justice, and the American way!
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Television The Western
Davy CrockettKing of the Wild Frontier
Sheriff Matt Dillon, Gunsmoke
The Lone Ranger(and his faithfulsidekick,
Tonto) Who is that masked man??
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Television - Family Shows
Glossy view of mostly middle-class suburban
life.
But...
The Honeymooners
I Love Lucy
Social Winners?... AND Losers?
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Teen Culture

• In the 1950s ? the word teenager entered
  the American language.
• By 1956 ? 13 mil. teens with 7 bil. to spend
  a year.

1951 ? race music ? ROCK N ROLL
Elvis Presley ? The King
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Teen Culture
Juvenile Delinquency ???
1951 ? J. D. Salingers A Catcher in the Rye
James Dean inRebel Without a Cause (1955)
Marlon Brando inThe Wild One (1953)
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Teen Culture

• The Beat Generation
• Jack Kerouac ? On The Road
• Allen Ginsberg ? poem, Howl
• Neal Cassady
• William S. Burroughs

Beatnik
Clean Teen
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Teen Culture
Behavioral Rules of the 1950s
Obey Authority. Control Your Emotions. Dont Make
Waves ? Fit in with the Group. Dont Even Think
About Sex!!!
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Religious Revival

• Today in the U. S., the Christian faith is
  back in the center of things. -- Time magazine,
  1954

Church membership 1940 ? 64,000,000
1960 ? 114,000,000
Television Preachers 1. Catholic Bishop
Fulton J. Sheen ? Life is Worth Living 2.
Methodist Minister Norman Vincent Peale ?
The Power of Positive Thinking 3. Reverend Billy
Graham ? ecumenical message warned against
the evils of Communism.
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Religious Revival
Hollywood apex of the biblical epics.
The Robe The Ten Commandments
Ben Hur 1953 1956
1959
Its un-American to be un-religious!
-- The Christian Century, 1954
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Well-Defined Gender Roles
The ideal modern woman married, cooked and cared
for her family, and kept herself busy by joining
the local PTA and leading a troop of Campfire
Girls. She entertained guests in her familys
suburban house and worked out on the trampoline
to keep her size 12 figure.
-- Life magazine, 1956
MarilynMonroe
The ideal 1950s man was the provider, protector,
and the boss of the house. -- Life magazine,
1955

• 1956 ? William H. Whyte, Jr. ? The
  Organization Man
• a middle-class, white suburban male is the ideal.

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Well-Defined Gender Roles
Changing Sexual Behavior Alfred Kinsey
1948 ? Sexual Behavior in the Human
Male 1953 ? Sexual Behavior in
the Human Female

• Premarital sex was common.
• Extramarital affairs were frequent among married
  couples.

Kinseys results are an assault on the family as
a basic unit of society, a negation of moral law,
and a celebration of licentiousness.
-- Life magazine, early 1950s
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• Progress Through Science

1951 -- First IBM Mainframe Computer 1952 --
Hydrogen Bomb Test 1953 -- DNA Structure
Discovered 1954 -- Salk Vaccine Tested for
Polio 1957 -- First Commercial U. S. Nuclear
Power Plant 1958 -- NASA Created 1959 --
Press Conference of the First 7
American Astronauts
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• Progress Through Science

1957 ? Russians launch SPUTNIK I
1958 ? National Defense Education Act
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• Progress Through Science

UFO Sightings skyrocketed in the 1950s.
War of the Worlds
Hollywood used aliens as a metaphor for whom ??
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• Progress Through Science

• Atomic Anxieties
• Duck-and-Cover Generation

• Atomic Testing
• 1946-1962 ? U. S. exploded 217
  nuclear weapons over the Pacific
  and in Nevada.

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Politics and War

• The Cold War
• The tension and rivalry between the USA and the
  USSR was described as the Cold War (1945-1990).
• There was never a real war between the two sides
  between 1945 and 1990, but they were often very
  close to war (Hotspots). Both sides got involved
  in other conflicts in the world to either stop
  the spread of communism (USA) or help the spread
  (USSR).

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• The USA and the USSR were the two world
  Superpowers.
• The USA was a capitalist society with a
  democracy.
• The USSR was a communist country with a
  dictatorship.
• Both wanted to be the most powerful nation in the
  world.

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Nuclear Tensions

• The USA had shown its atomic power when it
  exploded the A-bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki at
  the end of World War 2.
• The USSR was also developing atomic
  weapons/bombs.
• The USA and the USSR were in competition with
  each other to have the best, most powerful
  weapons in the world this was called the Arms
  Race.

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New Communist Countries

• Many countries became communist after World War 2
  including
• Czechoslovakia (1948)
• Poland (1947)
• Hungary (1947)
• China (1949)
• Cuba (1959)
• North Korea (1945)

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Germany Divided

• Germany, which had been ruled by the Hitler and
  the Nazis until their defeat in 1945 was split in
  two.
• The western side became West Germany and the
  eastern side became East Germany.
• East Germany became another communist country

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The Domino Effect

• The USA did not want communism to spread any
  further they were worried about the domino
  effect (one country becomes communist, then
  another, then another etc)

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The Iron Curtain

• The Iron Curtain was a term used to show that
  communism had created a sharp division in Europe.

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America Responds

• The U.S. adopted the policy of containment and
  decided to do whatever it took to contain or stop
  communism.
• Truman Doctrine
• Provided aid to Turkey and Greece in order to
  stop communism in those countries.

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The Marshall Plan

• A massive program of aid to help Europe rebuild
  and get back on its economic feet.

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The Crisis in Berlin

• With the start of the Cold War, it became clear
  that the Soviets planned to keep their German
  zone under Communist control.
• The British, Americans, and French began to take
  steps to set up a free, democratic government
  within their German zones.

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• The western zone eventually became known as the
  Federal Republic of Germany, or West Germany.
• The British, Americans, and French also tried to
  set up a democratic government in West Berlin.
• The Soviets were not happy with the idea of a
  Western-style government and economy in the
  middle of the Soviet zone of occupation.

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The Soviets Block Traffic

• In June 1948 the Soviets announced that they
  would block any road, rail, or river traffic into
  West Berlin.
• West Berlins residents were cut off from food,
  coal, and other products.
• West Berlin was not completely cutoff because it
  had airstrips.

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The Berlin Airlift

• British and American planes began making
  deliveries to West Berlin.
• The Berlin Airlift continued for months and
  months.
• Finally, the Soviet Union lifted its blockade on
  May 12, 1949.

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North Atlantic Treaty Organization (1949)

• United States
• Belgium
• Britain
• Canada
• Denmark
• France
• Iceland
• Italy

• Luxemburg
• Netherlands
• Norway
• Portugal
• 1952 Greece Turkey
• 1955 West Germany
• 1983 Spain

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Berlin Blockade Airlift (1948-49)
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The Korean War 1950-1953
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The Korean War

• North Korea invaded South Korea on June 25, 1950.
• Most leaders in the United States were surprised
  by this attack.
• Truman decided that the United States would take
  a stand against Communist aggression in Korea and
  sent in ground troops.

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Combat in the Korean War

• UN forces made an amphibious landing behind North
  Korean lines at the port city of Inchon.
• The September 1950 invasion at Inchon was a key
  victory for UN forces.
• By October 1950 all of South Korea was back in UN
  hands.

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• UN forces had begun to move into North Korea, but
  the when 260,000 Chinese troops joined the North
  Koreans the UN began to retreat.
• UN forces retreated all the way back to Seoul.
  It was the longest fallback in U.S. military
  history.

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MacArthur is Fired

• MacArthur said that the UN faced a choice between
  defeat by the Chinese or a major war with them.
• He wanted to expand the war by bombing the
  Chinese mainland, perhaps even with atomic
  weapons.

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• Lieutenant General Matthew Ridgway stopped the
  Chinese onslaught and pushed them back to the
  38th parallelwithout needing to expand the war
  or use atomic weapons.
• MacArthur disagreed with President Truman about
  the direction of the fighting and challenged the
  authority of the president.

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Fighting ends in Korea

• In July 1951 peace talks began.
• One major obstacle was the location of the
  boundary between the Koreas.
• In October 1951 peace talks stalled over
  prisoners of war.
• Negotiators in Panmunjom continued to argue over
  the details of a peace agreement throughout 1952.
  

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• In 1952 Dwight D. Eisenhowerwho promised to end
  the warwas elected president.
• An armistice agreement was finally reached on
  July 27, 1953.
• The Korean War left the map of Korea looking much
  as it had in 1950.

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Trying to Build a Better World

• 50 nations met in June 1945 to create the UN
  Charter.
• The Charter committed its members to respect
  fundamental human rights, respect treaties and
  agreements, and to promote the progress and
  freedom of all people.

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Universal Declaration of Human Rights

• It declared that all human beings are born free
  and equal.
• It called for an end to slavery, torture, and
  inhumane punishment.
• It demanded a variety of civil rights, including
  the right to assembly and the right to access the
  courts.
• It stated that elementary education should be
  free and available to all.

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• The 50s Come to a Close

1959 ? Nixon-Khrushchev Kitchen
Debate
Cold War -----gt Tensions
lt----- Technology Affluence